The first event of the year was run over the weekend with racing held both days, top riders such as world champion Steph Bridge and her son Ollie were in attendance as well as Callum Edge, Lee ‘Pasty’ Harvey and myself (Denzil Williams).

Day 1 had light winds in the morning and most riders were on their biggest kite, the sky was adorned with plenty of North Dyno’s, an F-One bandit, a Slingshot Turbine and a Flysurfer! The course was the classic sausage/up and down race and we ran 3 races back to back in the morning and each race seemed to have a Bridge rider wining it (be it mainly Ollie) with the rest of the fleet fighting it out for places behind. I managed a 2nd place in one race while Callum was always finishing in the top three with Pasty not far behind.

Each race took around 13 minutes to run and the top five riders were all fairly close’ish!

The temperature was really quite cold, layers of neoprene were worn with even ikitesurf editor Rou Chater getting a pair of booties on, then promptly regretting it for not being able to get his feet in the straps properly!

In the afternoon we ran 2 more races back to back and the sun was starting to make an appearance which glistened off the 30 or so large off shore wind Turbines that made for a nice back drop. The wind had picked up and most riders changed down a size in kites, I went from a 14m to a 10m while most other riders were on 12/13m. Young Ollie continued to make his presence felt and seemed to be dominating most races.

Day 2 had a miserable start with mist and drizzle but the wind was blowing and it was decided to run 4 back to back races. The wind had changed direction so the course was changed but still set up as a sausage course. Again Ollie was the leading rider with his mother close behind, Pasty seemed to be catching lots of weed with his long fins and I managed to slip past him a couple of times but the most interesting points of the day were from Rou and Callum who both come a cropper from a native species of the sea, I saw Callum hopping his board out of the water thinking he had weed attached to his fins but when he came ashore he enlightened us with his story that it felt more than weed attached to his fins so he stopped and flipped his board over to discover what looked like a ‘mackerel’ stuck in his middle fin! With the same fate happening to poor old Rou.

Actually 3 sponsored riders and 1 North rep racing! and all the freestyle fleets were also dominated by North on the podium and in numbers.This just goes to show that North has the best team riders in the UK that like to compete and go to events. Be great if other brands could get their riders to compete at the UK comps and then join in the racing with us instead of sitting on the beach when its light.The more the merrier and there could be some great battles within their freestyle fleets to beat each other on the race course. at least they get to say 'I beat you' instead of 'hope we ride next time'!

Hope to see plenty of the Slingshot Team as well as all the other top brands at Watergate Bay, Cornwall 21-22nd April

yeah Bobbi, its even worse being beaten by a woman too…;) I think she has dished out some beatings to the WORLD BEST men on the racecourse over the years so when the son starts winning events against her its a pretty safe bet that the kid is going to be very good.

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